


Beneath the Ice

by Akiko_Natsuko



Series: GrayLu [1]
Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Character Death, Denial, F/M, Friendship, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Loss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-19
Updated: 2019-01-19
Packaged: 2019-10-12 17:26:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17471816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akiko_Natsuko/pseuds/Akiko_Natsuko
Summary: The tears still wouldn’t come, even as it felt like he was being torn apart inside and he was barely aware of his magic bursting out around him. Ice creeping across every inch of the building and sealing them away from the rest of the world. It wasn’t a spell, he was too far gone for that. All he wanted was to block everything out.





	Beneath the Ice

 

    Gray had thought that he had known heartache before. He had lost his parents – he had lost his father twice, and he had lost Ur and Ultear. His heart had been torn to shreds many times, and he’d shed more than his fair share of tears, and yet that hadn’t been enough. Apparently, he hadn’t lost enough…he hadn’t hurt enough. And all that past pain paled in comparison to the sheer agony that was tearing him apart as he crawled across the Cathedral floor, heading towards the figure sprawled by the altar, his vision blurring with tears although none of them managed to fall. They had won. He knew that much as had heard the shouts of triumph and celebration from outside, and he had caught a glimpse of Natsu being hauled off for medical treatment before he had gone in search of the one person he wanted to see. Only there had been no welcoming smile, no brown eyes brightening at the sight of him, just silence and the too still figure of the Celestial Mage.

“Lucy…” He whispered as he reached her side, blinking furiously to clear his vision as he searched for some sign of life. She had to be alive…she had to. They had promised that they were both going to come through this. It had been Lucy who had silenced him the night before when he had tried to ask her the question that had been burning on the tip of his tongue for weeks now. He had wanted to ask her to marry him before the battle, wanting to make sure that she had a reason to fight, to stay alive, and to come back to him. He had seen it in her eyes when she had stopped him, she had known exactly what he had in mind, and there had been a spark in her eyes when she had told him to wait. A spark that told him that she wanted them to take that step when the future was stretched out in front of them, not the evening before it might all be lost, but she had promised that she would do everything in her power to come back to him so that he could ask her.

  _It was our promise…_

    The air around him was already growing colder, his magic responding to the emotions that he still wasn’t ready to acknowledge. _She’s not dead, she can’t be…_ His fingers were trembling, shaking wildly as he fumbled for a pulse, refusing to see the way her chest lay still and silent, but it was impossible to deny the lack of life beneath his searching fingertips. And he fell back with a low, guttural noise of pain, scrambling back on his hands and rear as though he could flee the truth. _Lucy…_ The tears still wouldn’t come, even as it felt like he was being torn apart inside and he was barely aware of his magic bursting out around him. Ice creeping across every inch of the building and sealing them away from the rest of the world. It wasn’t a spell, he was too far gone for that. All he wanted was to block everything out, to stop anything from taking her away from him.

_Lucy…_

_I won’t let you go…_

****

Two days later:

    It had been two days since the battle had ended in victory for Fairy Tail and its allies, not that it felt like a victory. Too much had been endured and lost for there to be anything but relief that the battle was over, and yet the guild had found itself in limbo, and the cause of that limbo lay in Kardia Cathedral. It had been two days since ice had encased the building and the surrounding street, ice so thick and robust that so far no one had been able to penetrate it. Not even Erza’s Flame Empress had been able to make the slightest dent in it. The only thing they had been able to confirm was that it wasn’t Iced Shell, a pale-faced Lyon had been able to tell him that much, but even he hadn’t been able to do anything about the ice. It had been made with Gray’s Devil-slaying magic which meant that it was beyond him, but it was more than that, and there had been tears in his eyes when he had stepped away from the ice and warned them that it was ice born from pain and that it wouldn’t be easily melted.

    It was Natsu, still barely able to move after the battle and his magic little more than a weak trickle that approached the ice that morning. The others had tried to stop him, and not just because of his condition, but for fear of how Gray might react to him now, but Natsu had been adamant. He was one of the few that knew of Gray and Lucy’s relationship, not that it had ever been discussed, but there was no way to miss how their scents had become intertwined over the months, or how both of them would brighten up when the other was nearby. He had been happy for them, and he had hoped that once all this was over, they would have the chance to announce it to the world and to move forward. It had been what he had fought for, and now what he was partially responsible for destroying, which was why he was willing to face whatever anger the Ice mage might fling at him.

“Gray…Lucy,” he murmured as he reached out to rest his hand against the ice, wincing as it burned against his skin. He knew what he was he going to find inside because he knew Gray well enough to know that there was only one thing that could have caused this kind of ice, and there were tears in his eyes as he let his flames flicker to life around his hand. 

   It took longer than he liked to even make a dent in the ice, his efforts hindered by his own flickering magic and the sheer strength of Gray’s ice. The Ice mage clearly didn’t want to let anyone close. However, there was no way Natsu could ignore what was happening, knowing that Lucy would never forgive him if he allowed the Ice mage to do something stupid, and he would never forgive himself. Slowly inch by inch he managed to melt a path through the ice, ignoring the exhaustion pressing in on him as he pressed onwards, dreading what he was going to find and praying that he wasn’t too late.

_Please,_ _Gray…_

**                                                                         

    Gray had felt it the moment that his ice had been breached, but he lacked the strength or willpower to do anything about it anymore. He had spent every moment of the last couple of days at Lucy’s side, cradling the hand that bore her guild-mark between his hands, a fine layer of ice decorating her porcelain skin in an attempt to keep her as she was, to stop himself from losing her. No tears had fallen in that time. It hurt too much for tears, and yet now as he felt a familiar warmth moving into the cathedral something else stirred beneath the numbness. Anger. Deep, dark anger that he hadn’t known since he’d hunted Deliora roaring to life, and there was a snarl on his lips as he gently laid Lucy’s hand down and turned to face the invader.

“Gray…” Natsu’s voice was soft, grief written openly across his face as olive eyes flickered to the still form of the Celestial Mage and it was that which made the Ice mage snap. Fury coursed through him, and for the first time in days he felt the pain easing as it was buried beneath the darker emotion, and he seized hold of that feeling as he launched himself at the Dragon-slayer with a wordless roar.

    Natsu made no attempt to defend himself, letting Gray’s momentum carry them both down to the floor with a crash, although he barely managed to hold back a cry of pain as his already injured body hit the ice harder than he’d anticipated. However, he wasn’t given a chance to focus on that pain, because fists were raining down on him from above and he closed his eyes as he took the onslaught without complaint. Gray was snarling at him, hurling accusations and angry words that hurt far more than the fists currently slamming into his face and chest, but Natsu bore it in silence. It had hurt to see Lucy like that, to see his best friend reduced to that and he could barely begin to imagine what Gray must be feeling, and so he took the beating.

   It didn’t take long for Gray’s strength, already drained from days of maintaining his ice barrier and holding back the emotions that lay beneath the numbness, to wane, and it was only when he collapsed against Natsu a few minutes later that he realised that the Fire mage had made no attempt to stop him. That he made no attempt to defend himself, and something shattered as he pushed himself up just enough to see the other mage peering up at him with tearful eyes. The Dragon-slayer was a mess, pre-existing bandages now covered with fresh blood and his face was already swelling, blood trickling from his nose and a split lip, and yet despite the pain he must’ve been in, there was nothing but understanding on Natsu’s face.

“Why…?” Gray’s voice broke, and his hands clenched into fists against the Dragon-slayer’s chest, but the anger that had consumed him only moments before was gone. “Why…?”

    Natsu wasn’t sure whether the Ice mage was asking why he had taken the beating, or why Lucy had been taken from them, and he figured that it didn’t really matter. All that mattered was that Gray was hurting and that unless he let it out, he was only going to destroy himself. Biting his lip to stop himself whimpering, he reached up and yanked the Ice mage into a hug, holding on even as Gray weakly fought to free himself.

“Because you loved her, and because you’re destroying yourself,” he whispered softly into the Ice mage’s ear, surprised when all the fight drained out of Gray a moment, the other mage slumping in his arms. “Gray...?”

“I was going to ask her to marry me…” Gray whispered brokenly, and Natsu closed his eyes at the pain in his friend’s voice. He had known they were close and getting closer, but he hadn’t known that they were getting to that stage and his heart ached anew for what had been taken from both of them, and he tightened his arms around the Ice mage as he felt Gray shudder, his voice faltering as he continued.  “She made me wait. I was going to do it the moment the fight ended, but she…she…” Dark eyes flickered across to where Lucy lay, and his voice trailed off into a broken sob, and he squeezed his eyes shut, desperately trying to fight back the feelings and tears that he had managed to keep at bay until now.

    However, it was a battle that he was never going to win, and there was no holding back the anguished howl that rose in his throat, his fingers digging tightly into the material of Natsu’s vest, as he finally fell apart completely. It hurt. More than anything he had ever felt before. Great heaving sobs wracking his body, and tears trickling down his cheeks as the numbness faded away completely. _Lucy was gone_... There wasn’t going to be a happy ever after for them, there would be no more listening to her soft voice as she read him snippets of her story. No more walks beneath the stars where he would listen to her talking about her spirits, never really focusing on the words, but rather the brightness in her eyes as she spoke about them. No more stolen hugs and kisses, or quiet evenings spent curled up in bed together.

   It was all gone, and as he screamed out his pain against Natsu, he was vaguely aware of the ice around them beginning to melt, no longer able to shield him from his pain or the reality of the situation.

_Lucy is gone._


End file.
